In Past Show

About Janice Biala

Janice Biala, Jack Tworkov’s sister who frequently went just by the name Biala, contributed to the shaping of modernism with her paintings of interiors, portraits, and scenes from her travels through France, Spain, Italy, and Morocco. From Provincetown to Marrakech, Biala captured the unique light of each city as she rendered its signature landmarks in bold, simplified shapes, as in the semi-abstracted trees in her depiction of the Tuileries in Paris (Jardin du Palais Royal, 1972). In its flatness of color, Biala’s work recalls that of Henri Matisse, yet it also posseses a painterly directness reminiscent of the Abstract Expressionists. As such, Biala has been said to synthesize the styles popular in the circles she orbited—the early 20th-century Parisian avant-garde and the mid-century New York School.